lightning and thunder have you seen it...

I wonder if there has been any thunder or lightning yet somewhere on
the rez...I am wondering if it has come and gone... for us this time marks the change of seasons, the stories of winter are put away and the things of summer come…it has always been so with First Thunder…

I wonder because I remember one time a long time ago, maybe by Agathla Peak by Kayenta or Cedar Ridge, or maybe by Grand Falls, or was it over by Borrego Pass way before there were any Beliganas (White Men) in the area, there were two brothers who travelled across this land called Dinetah.

One brother while camping with the other was introduced to relations, an old man, one they would call Che, explained to the boys that the Mountain Rising to the East, a mountain with black streaks was not a good place to visit, that it was not a safe place to go.

This in the days when Holy Beings followed closely the people, the Dine' living within a place where it was bordered by Four Sacred Mountains. They came in many forms to teach, to talk and to warn people on how they should live. This was done through song, ceremony and teaching. An old man told these two young boys to be careful and that this mountain was not a place to be.

When the boys sat in camp, they talked about going different places to visit the Arrow People, where they lived at the Head of the Earth. The one brother left that way on his own and the other sat around the fire, as he sat there he made bread by throwing the bread made from what is now called drop seeds and fashioned this into a cake and placed it in the ashes of the fire to cook. The wood used as juniper.

They were taught to use juniper, because scientists now days would
find that the blue ash given off is a form of calcium that can only be found in this way, juniper ash and when it coated this bread it provided a needed nutrient to these people. It was not written then, but they were told to do this and so they did.

This young man thought about going up on the mountain and the words and said to himself..."I wonder why they told me not to go up there?"

He sat there and thought about it to himself. "I wonder why they told
me not go up there? It is a mountain like any other"

He sat there and thought about it and said, "I am young, I am strong, I am fast and I know more about these things. Those old people don't really know anything, they are superstitious. I know more. I don't
under stand them, I don't need to....so I will go up there and see
for myself"

He went to sleep and slept under the stars and the Wind whispered
to him, because the Wind was a carrier of messages, that is why the
Navajo have the Windway Ceremony. Anyway, he went to sleep and when
he woke, he could hear the sound of thunder, rolling from the East,
then the South, then the West and then to the North. He got up and
rubbed his eyes and after gathering himself set out for the mountain
he was told not to go to...."

As he went he picked up some arrows and pointed them down to the
ground as he put them in his quiver, and that is when his trouble
started....from this he went on his way and would learn about Bear Man, the six beings who were not destroyed by the Twin Heros, meet a young maiden who was not what she appeared to be and many more things which are told in a certain way at a certain time…so it goes"

The stories, myths and legends of these people called Navajo with
funny names for places have some truth in them, it is through storytelling that some things are taught. I am no expert on the Navajo Way, but some things I remember. johnny rustywire

Yesterday morning I spoke with a young woman
Who sat and cried that her Che was gone

I went over to see them as he was someone
I had known for some time

Did I tell you
your grandfather and I went
to Boarding School together

Yes many of us went there a long time ago
It seems it was just the other day

Early this morning in the early frost I got up
It was twilight the time before dawn
In the stillness the years of my life came to mind
To all those that I have known

When I was a child I played on red sandstone
And ran at my mother’s feet
it was just over there
and just a little way away
my father called me and I answered

In school I sat next boys and girls
You know them it was the same for your
You will know them all of your life

Getting on a bus to go to school
Far from home without family
Just indian kids to find our way
To sleep on bunk beds in old buildings
To talk English and stand in line

To eat at the dining hall all year long
Waking up this morning
We have all gone different ways
Some never to be seen again
Others who live just a stone throw away

We shared many things,
To run and play and yet sit quietly
We used to laugh with each other
In the summer to play in the sand and to gather wood
To follow the sheep on hot days and cool nights
We ran to distant mesas and walked these reservation roads

I got up and sat there in the dark
I could hear these thoughtsfrom years ago
These things come to mind all your life
Where will I go
What will I be
Will I go to the moon
To live in big cities and see the world
That is what I heard, the sounds of youth

We really didn’t go that far
Just over the mesa
Just down by the wash
to the second house
With the red roof

To live, to find a life
Just beyond the sage
To hear the wind blow through
Junipers and cedars
To hear the sound of sheep bells

To go out and find life
This boy I knew started from here
Just over there beyond the mesa
Their place was there

In time he met someone
She was from that place
They call it where there is a circle of trees
Teec Nos Pos

Some said they were crazy to get together
They are a too young
They have nothing but really what it is there
Just a pocket full of dreams, a few clothes
But the gleam in their eyes
You see that is better than gold
For their lives where cast in the dawn
Where life grows and is renewed each day

Time has shown they made a good choice
Little children laughed at their place
Now they are all on their own

I remember one day he got up and was alone
She had go to see where it is that lies beyond the dawn
His step as a little slower and he was quiet
But he loved the laughter of children
And had an easy smile and something to say
To everyone that was his way

He had gone away for while but these dusty mesas
Call you and you listen for the quiet
You dream of soft rain and rainbows
That is how it is
To make a family and return
To Dinetah, our land

A life lived in the sticks
a hard life to haul water and wood
to get stuck in the mud and snow
way out in the middle of no where

Now the winter of many snows has come
And flecks of gray gather like dust
So we came home and live here
And from here we go on

To where the winds go
Far beyond any place I have travelled
And there I suspect she waits
The one who made him laugh long ago

To the mothers who reached out
When were were children
To the grandfathers who sang our songs
And I know they came
And offered sweet corn
And some Navajo tea

Today what we feel it is too much to bear
But something reached out and touched me
I mean the kind of feeling where someone is with you
as if you feel them with you
In all the world
there are so many places to go
but for a moment
it stops for just a little while


to know life
to taste it
to see all things
to know everything

As times goes by and you get older
Sometimes there is the longing of the heart
for the lost days of summer

but it really doesn't matter because in a moment
thoughts travel like lightning through stormy skys
and pierce the cobwebs of clouded mind
so we touch eternity for a moment

we go down our own path having known
that somewhere, some place
there are good hearts
color creed vanity and place vanish
so I take your kindness with me forever
let it be said that we stood here and go on
in the mountains, the sky and in all the things
our dear Mother Earth has given us

but in searching for this I find
that there are others waiting
They are small and still growing and have dreams
Their touch is like summer and they follow us around
to taste sweet water, and wait to dance to my song

that you might find the beautyway
How does it go...ah yes it comes....

As I go this way and that way

let me walk in beauty
so that there is beauty before me,
that there is beauty behind me
that as I look up there is beauty above me
that there is beauty to the left of me
that there is beauty to the right of me
that all around there is beauty
come my child walk this way with me

rustywire

What about those Rez Dogs?

In Fort Defiance I came home to my place late one evening just the other day and Phil who is my best friend and neighbor has a cat. Now, I have a rez dog, Swifty. Now Swifty was sitting at the front porch with Phil's cat in his mouth.

The cat didn’t look good, in fact he looked dead. I didn't know how to tell Phil about his cat, so I took it inside and thought about what to do about it, so then I washed it up, blow dried the cats’ long hair and snuck over to the back porch of Phil’s house and put the cat there as if it were sleeping. Later I saw Phil and he didn't say anything about his cat.

The next day the same thing happened, Swifty had Phil's cat when I came home. I picked the cat up and thinking on what to do now I took her inside and washed it, blow dried the fur and then snuck the cat back over to Phil’s place and put it where it was before. Later on that evening when I saw Phil he didn’t say anything about his cat.

Well the next day the same thing happened again, this time I put the cat on the front porch of Phil’s house. By this time the cat looked worse for wear. When I got back to my place and went inside I heard Phil's wife just scream so loud you could hear it a long ways off. My wife and I ran over to their house and Phil was just standing there. I asked Phil what happened.

He looked at me and said, I just don't get it, that cat died three days ago and I buried it and she keeps coming back!

Old Indian at Bee Nah

During his past week I was in Bee Nah and ran into an old friend who I hadn't seen for 13 years or so. He looked good, he has a sharp mind and in a way is a person who questions why people do the things they do and as a result can rub people the wrong way, but he often speaks for natives.

He told me he has been living in a tipi for the past five years with his wife and two sons. He is by his name given to him when he was a child by his grandmother, called "old Indian", but not in English but in his native tongue. He has a good heart, a strong conviction to the grassroots people and a traditional lifesyle. He doesn't proselytize it but lives his life quietly without fanfare and yet represents the best of our way of life.

We talked for a while and he had to leave as he takes care of his mother. He himself suffered from polio as a child and walks with a stiff gait, yet his eyes are curiouis taking in everything he sees. He talked about his son and that he has quite an imagination as they have no television. He speaks his own language.

He would be considered poor by many but yet he is not as he retains a dignity by his existence and it can be seen in his countenance. He is not afraid to speak his mind and I got to know him when he was tribal court advocate. He was effective and diligent in the way he spoke for people who could not speak for themselves and even now questions the actions of the tribe and BIA, as well county and state actions that infringe on native issuues.

I was sent a link to a new book on natives that included modern portrains of indians. I went to the site and in looking over the pictures in the book you reference the pictures do not reflect a cross section of native life, but appear to be lacking and yet I can see my friend would never pose for such a picture as it would appear to him pretentious. So it goes on the rez...

A Note to the Students from Monument Valley High School and other schools on the Navajo Reservation.

I want to address the students from Monument Valley High School, Shiprock High School, Many Farms schools and other places of higher learning.

I know that you will be looking at the stories in the book, Navajo Spaceships which you are using in class. I want to apologize to you and all Navajo People for the poor grammar, mispelled words and poor way I used English in the book. The book was published as is, that is the stories are all first drafts that were taken as written from online discussion groups on the internet as I wrote them when I sat down at the computer. I did not forsee publication at that time and when the book was published it was done without any editing or proof reading and for thi sI am sorry. I want to you to know that proper use of the English language is necessary to achieve success in whatever you do.

I wrote the stories to portray life on Navajoland from the native perspective since there are so many misconceptions and hokey things written and hoped to provide some insight into the everyday life of our people, communities and how we get along.

Let me tell you something; I attended a gathering of Native Writers not too long ago, and there were people there representing various universities from the United States and Canada and they told me that because of the mispellings and grammatical errors in the book that it would prevent it from being used more widely at the college level.

I learned a bitter lesson that day that anything you send out should be well written and proper as it speaks for you and you are judged by it.

I monitor this site and will be making corrections to the stories you see online so that they may be more presentable to you for your English classes. I am sorry that the book went out that way as it represents how some perceive the Navajo People to be illiterate and backward which speaks more about me than the Navajo Tribe at large and for this I am sorry as I am Navajo and proud of my heritage.

signed "Johnny Rustywire"- Norman Cambridge, Author of Navajo Spaceships

Where Did the Name "Navajo Spaceships' the title of my book come from?

As some of you may know or not know I wrote a book which is basically of all the short stories I wrote on the internet on sites like Native Web, At.Native; Navajos.Com; Indianz.com and many others over a period of ten years and these were put out in a book called Navajo Spaceships.

Some people think Navajo Spaceships means it deals with aliens, new wave ideas, or science fiction. It does not, it is about travel into the imagination and in particular into my imagination as a Navajo or a native point of view of the world as I see it.

This is also because I am the product of a parochial school, boarding school and public schools situated on or near the Navajo Reservation. I am the result of a government education on the Navajo Reservation.

I often thought of things but wondered how would it be. I have done a lot fo thinking and observed many things as well as being able to work on indian records and indian allotment records for a number of years at the federal regional record centers and National Archives where indian records are stored.

I developed an interest in the lives and stories those records told and some of the experiences of others as well as myself. Some of these stories became short stories that went into the book Navajo Spaceships.

During one of my off times I was looking at the records of Carlisle Indian School, one of the first boarding schools set up for indians in the last century. I often see many pictures in the files of indian students, lots of them but there are rarely ever named, except for their teachers or visiting dignitary.

I looked at them because I am sure there are pictures of me standing with others in particular one occasion I can remember was when Robert F. Kennedy came to the Flagstaff Bordertown Dormitory and all the big shots in the local area came to get their picture of themselves taken with Senator Kennedy and "those Indian kids" one of whom was Me.

Anyway I found a reference to Nellie Robertson, a Sioux girl taken off the plains and sent to Carllisle Indian School, who later became a teacher there until the school closed in 1908.

The thing about her was that once she learned to speak and write English she wrote about life from her native perspective, and on of these stories has survived and if follows. It is about how she envisioned life on the moon from a Sioux girl's perspective and her native upbringing. It amazed me and gave me the thought of writing from my own view of the world of the Navajo reservation, boarding school, growing up and life as it is out in the sticks if you will.

So from that perspective the name Navajo Spaceships came to me for my book, as it is a flight into the imagination of a Navajo from the rez, so I thought I would put here the story Nellie Robertson, a fellow indian boarding school brat wrote for you to see....rustywire

"This little nugget was pointed out to me in the June 27, 1890 INDIAN HELPER by Russell Eagle Bear of Sinte Gleske College. Of all the news he found in those papers, this is the item that caught his eye and he took a photocopy with him. Thank you, Russell, for finding this one.

A COMPOSITION BY ONE OF OUR IMAGINATIVE SIOUX GIRLS

Of the many strange lands and queer places I have visited in my life, the strangest and the one I have experienced more pleasure was my trip to the moon, in 1900. I got on board an air ship which was bound for the moon, one fine morning in June. Quite a number of people were starting for the same place.

For many days we sailed through the air. The scenery all the way was delightful both day and night, but the motion of the ship in air having the same effect as the motion of the ship on water, we did not enjoy the sights very much on the way.

After many days of travelling, we landed in a large city called Ujipa, which means in our language, Greentown. The lunarians resemble the people of the earth in every way but the color of their eyes and hair. The color of their eyes is a bright green and their hair a very bright yellow. Both men and women dress alike, in a loose gown,but you can distinguish them by their way of wearing their hair. The men have long hair and wear it in two or three plaits in the back. The women have short hair and wear little caps to match their eyes. They are a very kind and polite people.

Up in the moon they have no school-houses nor books of any kind from which to read or study. They are a blissful people. They know nothing outside of what is going on in their own world. Money is of no use to them there. Food of every kind grows all the year round. A sort of fruit something like our cheese grows on trees very abundantly, and they call it bread. Corn, potatoes, cabbage and numerous vegetables grow wild. Watermelons, pumpkins and squashes grow on trees, apples, oranges, peaches and grapes may be found in abundance. The people do not work very hard for their food. Their clothes are made from the leaves of a very large plant. These leaves measure about 20 square feet. They make very strong and durable clothes.

The houses are built only of wood and beautiful. The people are ruled over by their king, Nonboose Kiang, which we know as "The Man in the Moon." He is a good, kind man and is liked by all his people.

The amusements and habits of the lunarians are very much like ours. They were so kind to us that when the time came for us to go leave we werevery sorry. I hope sometime in the future to take another trip and see more things of interest.

-Nellie Robertson."

So now you know why Navajo Spaceships is called by this name, it is a book of short stories and in a way inspired by a young native girl who wrote this way before I came along. It is quite a story...idinit. rustywire

Medicinemen for Hire

Medicine man for hire

I have taken a look at the Medicinemanforhire website and have found there are some Navajo men, the Morrisses from Sheepsprings offering their services as practitioners As medicinemen/peyote men. I can not speak for them but these things I remember.

An old man and women rode a matched pair of horses down a long windy dusty road somewhere over by Cow Springs, Tonalea. They carried saddle bags filled with hard goods, turquoise and silver jewelry, heavy stuff.

These would be offered to the man they were going to see. He was of simple means but known to many, even these two who had travelled a 100 miles to see him. They had left a couple of days earlier from the Chuska Mountains crossing along by Star Mountain, skirting Canyon De Chelly, past Round Rock and straight on to Rough Rock and up over Black Mesa. Their clothes were dusty and worn but they carried with them a request that this Singer come to the their place to restore harmony.

A call had gone out after the family and all the relations sat down for a meeting. Someone was ailing and it was decided a Singer was needed. There is a man from way over by Cow Springs someone said and so the old couple wanted to go. They had not been that way for a long time and they wanted to see this country again, so the horses were fed and watered. Family brought out the hard goods, heavy bracelets, three conchos made in the last century by Slim Silversmith. It was good, they packed it away and set out to the west.

The family scattered out into the area, there had to be three places found
where those families would host one night each. The sing goes on for three nights and in a different place each night. Preparations for a sing, cutting wood, gathering plants, these things are what nalis (aunts) do and the old Che’s (grandpas) do as elders, they talk about the important things, who was to sing, take charge of the animals, gathering food, blankets, and help from the local area. Each went his way to different places to ask for help and support for this sing.

As these messengers went out, they would come to a place far from where
they had started. On sighting a horse rider, the children would run into the hogan or chao-, shade house and summon the older folks and parents. In some cases the rider would go up to the place and someone from inside would say, Ohshde’, Come in, and so they went in and sat down reaching for whatever the family was eating without asking and sharing a meal. After some food was eaten they would commence to say in the long way of doing so, the circumstances of what happened at a certain time and exlain the need.

That is how it happens, someone gets ill or sick and so that is why they are there. The family considers this and after a little bit offers what they can, coffee, beans, a sheep, a son-in-law to chop wood, maybe a singer who can make the feet light in the night to the sway of many men and women who sing. My father is one of these men, he could all night and his voice carried far.

There is a cedar log bonfire. It is a beautiful thing to stand near the edge and look out on a group standing close together in the night, not too far from the fire. They sing long and with a rhythm learned over a long time. Some call this a squaw dance, but it is really called a Night Way, there is social dancing to bring good spirits to this place. They sing all night; their voices raising and following the embers that float into the night sky.

A little ways away there are those who dance to the songs as a group on a simple dance floor cleared in the brush. It is ladies choice, women in shawls move about and with a swish, a touch call on the men to dance. The men have to pay, some a dollar, others more. Some want to run and hide, others dance while the stars move slowly across the sky, it is a good night for all.

Not too far off there is movement not seen by many of those there. They come quietly without a sound and they have names like Corn Bug Girl, Pollen Boy, Monster Slayer, Bear Man and many others who move in passed the ongoings outside into the hogan, to the heart of it all. They step into the circle of the Rainbow Guardians and look about them at the Singer who has called them there.

This old man from Tonalea, he speaks each word carefully and slowly, taking care to do everything right, this is his time and he makes it so. Each grain of sand has it’s place, each rattle and song giving a call to those that can provide the restoration of heart, mind and soul to the patient sitting quietly listening and learning.

I stand not too far off on the outside and take a rest on the blankets
set aside for me. My grandmother and mother are making bread for tomorrow, kneading it so it is just right. As for me I take a break and lay down for little bit. I can hear them; those outside and their voices hanging in the air.

Yasho, I am Navajo, Dine’, I am glad to be born during this time. I shall dance in the house of my mother and sing in the places of my father, Dinetah, within the Four Sacred Mountains there is no other place for me…..

Medicinemen for hire, can offer me nothing…..nothing.

rustywire

For those who know a little about such things, it is good to know that the things that are not real fade away in time and are forgotten but those that real continue on with quiet way of life and some things endure and for this I am grateful...